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CNN EXCLUSIVE Rick Perry to Hillary Clinton: Where’s your loyalty?

CNN’s State of the Union features an exclusive interview between CNN’s Chief Congressional Correspondent Dana Bash and former Texas governor Rick Perry about the fight against ISIS, the 2016 presidential campaign, and Prime Minister Netanyahu’s speech to Congress.

On sending troops to fight ISIS: PERRY: Well, you need to look back and see the opportunities that we missed. Funding and giving weapons to the Syrian rebels could have stopped ISIS before they ever got out of Syria. Then as they moved into Iraq we had the opportunity with the Peshmerga to fund them, to give them heavy weaponry and we failed at that. So the options we have left are not the best ones. But having a coalition with the Jordanians, with the Saudis, with the other the other Middle Eastern countries is

BASH: Which is what the Obama administration is doing.

PERRY: But they’re the lesser of options and I’ll also suggest to that we are also going to have to have our military actively engaged with those special operators from those other countries to eliminate the ISIS threat. And this administration is not –

BASH: So does that mean boots on the ground?

PERRY: It’s exactly what it means. I mean there’s no. I’m not trying to parse the words. It’s exactly what we should have.

BASH: There might be people watching this saying, okay here’s a Texas Governor who wants to be in the White House, who wants to send U.S. troops to the Middle East. We’ve seen this movie before. What would you say?

PERRY: I would suggest to them that I have the background and the ability to make decisions on my own and I think if American and Western values are in jeopardy and U.S. troops working with coalition force is how you stop ISIS, I think the bulk of the American people are going to say thank you Mr. President for standing up for our values, thank you for stopping this face of evil.

On the Clinton Foundation’s questionable donations: PERRY: I think most Americans realize that a phone call at three o’clock in the morning to the President of the United State about an issue that deals with a foreign country, that has given maybe tens of millions of dollars to the foundation that she oversees is not right and it’s not only the appearance of impropriety- it’s also the ethical side of this that I think most Americans really have a problem with. And I, I I’m really concerned that- not just going forward- but what has been received at the Clinton Foundation over the course of the years and how that affects this individual’s judgment.

BASH: I mean, she was Secretary of State so you could argue that she sort of you know that they’re going from the pool that she’s familiar with, if that makes sense

PERRY: You can argue that but I think it falls flat in the face of the American people when it comes to are you going to trust an individual who has taken that much money from a foreign source- where’s your loyalty?

TRANSCRIPT

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